


i relish being your wife

by tosca1390



Category: The Slains Series - Susanna Kearsley
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-15
Updated: 2015-12-15
Packaged: 2018-05-06 22:12:08
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,191
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5432651
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tosca1390/pseuds/tosca1390
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <i>“I think you ought to marry me,” she says at last. </i>
</p><p> </p><p>  <i>He starts under her touch, eyes widening slightly before crinkling at the edges. His mouth turns into a half-smile; a knave’s smile. </i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>“You are bold.”</i></p><p> </p><p>  <i>“You like me so,” she says, cheeks hot. </i></p>
            </blockquote>





	i relish being your wife

**Author's Note:**

  * For [theepiccek](https://archiveofourown.org/users/theepiccek/gifts).



> I had a lot of fun writing this, and I hope you enjoy! Thank you to those of you who looked at this for me. 
> 
> Happy Yuletide!

[-]

The ship rocks beneath Anna as she holds onto Edmund, her arms twined around his neck. The layers between them, of overcoats and waistcoats and shirts and dresses, are too thick to feel the warmth of bare skin as she desires. But she presses her fingertips to the nape of his neck, brushing over skin and short bristles of hair, and she feels him shudder. His lips, pressed to her bare throat, tremble. 

“What now?” he rasps. 

She opens her eyes to the grey light filtering through the cabin. “What do you mean?”

“I cannot keep you so, in this cabin,” he murmurs. She feels the press of his tongue against the beating pulse in her neck, and shivers. There is a hot muddled sensation low in her belly and she suddenly feels as if she wants to fly right out of her dress, right there in his arms. 

“Why not?” she asks, leaning back to meet his dark gaze. 

Edmund’s mouth twitches, the tops of his cheeks flushed. “The captain might want his cabin back. And, your father will kill me.”

“I thought we have already established that I do not find that necessary,” she says with a smile. “Though I will concede to the captain.” 

Her hands come to frame his face; his precious, hard-edged face. He has seen too much for someone so young. She wants to go on every adventure with him, and wants to keep him safe in doing so. Her palms fit to his cheeks, her fingertips drifting along his temples. He is quiet under her touch, but she can feel his muscles thrumming to life underneath her hands. She remembers his gentleness with the injured bird; would he be as gentle with her between his hands? Would she want him to?

“I think you ought to marry me,” she says at last. 

He starts under her touch, eyes widening slightly before crinkling at the edges. His mouth turns into a half-smile; a knave’s smile. 

“You are bold.”

“You like me so,” she says, cheeks hot. 

He slides his hands over her spine. The touch causes her to arch against him. It is a press of their bodies that isn’t enough and leaves her wanting more. 

“I love you so,” he says quietly, watching her. “I will go to your father and ask now, if you’d please.”

“I asked you, remember?”

He chuckles. The sound is rough, as if he does not laugh often. Anna would change that. His focus and intensity is a part of him, though. She would not love him if it were not so. 

“There is no one for you to ask with regards to my hand, Anna. You may allow me this one practice,” he says, his hands flat on her back. 

She nestles closer to him, her fingers sliding into his hair. _I will allow you many practices_ , she wants to say. Instead, she merely whispers, “Edmund.” 

Then his mouth is on hers once more, and she cannot think to breathe but for the air they share. 

[-]

David McClelland, neé Captain Jamieson, neé John Moray, goes quite pale when Anna and Edmund come before him, their bare hands clasped. 

Sitting next to him, the filmy grey light creating a faint sheen of gold around her hair, Sophia laughs. “You knew it was coming,” she chides her husband. Anna’s heart warms at the sight of her parents – her parents! – together and true. 

“I thought I had more time,” John says gruffly. 

“You will have plenty,” Anna says smartly. “I will stay with you until Edmund’s business is complete.”

Her father rises from his chair, taking his cane and moving towards the standing couple. His limp is there but he moves with ease. Anna can’t help but be proud of him. 

“You needn’t marry so quickly, lass. You can wait until he returns,” he says, his voice the same soft and serious tone she remembers. It gave her comfort when she was young and it still does now. 

Anna tightens her grip on Edmund’s hand. His thumb runs over her knuckles lightly. “I do not want to wait,” she says firmly. 

“Captain –“ Edmund begins, voice low, but John smiles suddenly. His smile changes his face, Anna thinks. It softens him. Her father is a hard man – she has always thought so, even when he was merely her friend at the nunnery. He has earned his hardness, she is sure. But it pleases her to see him still with joy in his heart. 

Sophia laughs. “You did not want to wait either, if I recall, John,” she says, all amusement. Anna presses her lips on a smile. 

“I suppose I did not,” John says. His winter-grey gaze moves from his wife to his daughter for a long quiet moment. Then, he clears his throat and stretches out his hand to Edmund. “I will speak to the ship’s captain.”

Edmund shakes John’s hand, smiling faintly. Anna releases Edmund and moves to her father, enfolding herself in his arms. 

“I did not think to lose you again so soon,” he murmurs into her ear as Edmund moves away to speak to her mother. 

Anna tightens her grip, her face pressed to his shoulder. Out of the corner of her eye she can see the polished black stone at his throat. “You never lost me. Just like I never lost you.”

Her father’s strong hands flex against her shoulders. She shuts her eyes and holds on. 

[-]

Night at sea is a strange sort of darkness. 

Anna cannot sit still as she waits. She paces the cabin she will share with Edmund for the duration of their sea journey, walking the fifteen steps back and forth from porthole to wall. Edging along the bunk, where there are fresh sheets and a pillow and her nightdress – a nightdress that has seen several decades and countries and lives –, she toes around her satchel, her hands steady at her skirts. 

She is an educated woman. She has spent most of her life with soldiers and their wives. Knowing the abstracts of the physical components of marriage, she understands theoretically what to expect. She is not afraid; it would be ridiculous to be so. She has spoken to the Empress of Russia, for heaven’s sake. 

Still, when she thinks of dancing the minuet in the Summer Gardens, Edmund’s hand at her waist and clasped in hers, she feels muddled in the head and overwhelmed by the heat in her lower belly. She remembers the touch of his mouth on hers and the feel of his hair under her fingertips and she wants more. She thinks she ought to be ashamed. But Anna has never felt shame so easily. 

Her mother seemed to know as much, bringing her aside prior to the brief but emotionally fraught ceremony on the top deck. 

“You look determined,” Sophia had said. They had stood in her parents’ room, Sophia fixing Anna’s hair into all soft curls at her neck. 

Anna had smiled. “I am.”

“You look just like your father,” Sophia had said. “He knew what he wanted, and he worked for it.”

“Do you think it improper?” Anna had asked, watching her mother carefully as to relearn her face. 

Sophia had smiled and hugged Anna tightly. “Never. I would never change you in your life.”

With the ceremony past, and Edmund taking care of business with her father down the hall, Anna continues to walk the length of their cabin. She wants him in her space, against her skin. She does not want gentleness, though she knows him capable of it. No, what she wants is fierceness. She has imagined his fierceness since the night in the Summer Gardens, and their slow first kiss; she does not want to imagine anymore. She wants to know. 

The boards creak outside the door. She stops near the porthole and watches silently as Edmund – her husband! – opens and shuts the door behind him. Cheeks flushed, he meets her gaze with sharp, intent focus. His quick mind and his strong hands – they are all hers for the next month at sea. 

“You were a long time in your scheming,” she says. 

His mouth quirks upward at the corners. “The scheming did not take long. Your father’s speech regarding your proper treatment – that was extensive.”

Anna smiles and walks towards him. He rests his weight against the door as she approaches, his hand reaching to settle at her waist. She takes his scarred hand between hers, leaning into him. Their joined hands rest in the hollow between her breasts. The warmth of his skin bleeds through the fabric of her dress. 

“I trust you,” she says softly. 

“Maybe you ought not to,” he whispers. 

She leans in and presses her lips to his cheek. “Too late,” she says, and moves her lips to his. 

His hand tightens on her waist and pulls her closer, pressing her as close to his long lean body as he can. She opens her mouth under his and closes her eyes, kissing him as deeply as she can without fainting. Their joined hands are crushed between their bodies, but she has no instinct to move. She just wants to sink into him and _feel_. 

The hand on her waist roams firmly along the line of her back, to her upswept curls. Slowly, as his tongue curls around hers and he finds the soft wet corners of her lips, he plucks the pins from her hair. Long curls sink and drape down her back. She releases his hand and wraps her arms around his neck, sinking her fingers into his dark hair. 

“Anna –“ he breathes against her mouth, their lips parting for a moment. “I want –“

“So do I,” she whispers breathlessly. 

He rests his forehead to hers, breathing heavily. His breath smells sweetly of the wine they had with dinner. “I never thought to have you,” he murmurs, guiding her back into the small room with slow steps. His hands are restless on her body, slipping over the laces of her dress at the front. Her bosom rises and falls sharply and she watches his hands, so flushed down her cheeks and throat. Slowly, he unthreads the laces to loosen the overlay of her dress. 

“Why?” she asks, wetting her lips. 

She can feel his gaze on her and she lifts her eyes to meet his. She’s never seen him quite so focused, so intense. A thrill of longing and heat trembles through her; it is all for _her_. 

He loosens her dress, the fabric slipping along her shoulders and down. Her dress pools at her legs, leaving her in her stays and shift. “Because I never get what I want,” he says matter-of-factly. “And I reckoned you deserved more.”

“I believe I get to decide what I deserve,” she says steadily, stepping out of the pool of dark fabric. A few lit candles spread a faint glow. She thinks of the letter in his hand that remains in her pocket, of how he expected her derision and scorn and yet gave his heart anyway. It gives her comfort, though she cannot help the gooseflesh that spreads over her bare arms. His dark eyes watch her hungrily, as if he expects her to vanish. 

“Your turn,” she says softly, stepping forward and reaching out. Her fingers search out the buttons of his coat. 

His arms come around her, nestling her close in the cradle of his body. “Anna,” he whispers. 

She pushes his coat off his shoulders, and his waistcoat. The fabric drops heavily to the boards around them. “I’m not scared,” she whispers, untying the neck of his coarse shirt and reaching down to the hem to pull it out of the waist of his breeches and over his head. 

Her heart seems to pause for a moment as she studies the bare skin revealed to her. There is a scar across his ribs, as if a sword slashed across it. Dark coarse hair lays across his upper chest and down in a thin line over the center of his taut body. She places a hand over his chest where his heart beats rapidly under muscle and bone, and he exhales loudly, hands fisted at his sides. 

“You are beautiful,” she says, and means it. His is a body meant for labor and strength. She does not want to become just another task for him. 

“Anna –“ he says, almost as a warning, but she walks in a slow circle around him, to his back. 

And stops. 

“Oh,” she says, laying her hand at his shoulder blade. White raised ridges– she would say twenty in total, to estimate – lay on his taut skin, administered with precision. She thinks of the scars on his hand. 

“Edmund,” she says, struggling to keep her voice level even as hot tears press against her eyes and in her throat. “Taking the fall for another here?”

He doesn’t reply, merely turns his head and glances at her over his shoulder. 

She exhales slowly. “I love you,” she says quietly, and – without real knowledge as to why – leans in to press her lips to the scars. 

A shudder runs through his muscles. He turns then and takes her in his arms. Her mouth opens under his by deeply-felt instinct, her arms banded around his bare waist. The press of his bare skin against her shift is thrilling, exhilarating. There is a fierceness to the kiss she cannot name as of yet but she feels it, wordless and deep in her flesh. She wants his hands everywhere. She wants to feel as if she can fly – in his arms, she just might. 

“You have no qualms, do you?” he whispers, backing her towards the small bunk. 

“None about you,” she retorts. “And ye would have heard about them already prior to my marrying you.”

He laughs, a rusty hoarse sound that she wants to make more familiar to his voice. “Faith, I believe it. Here,” he says, sitting her on the edge of the bunk. “Your shoes, wife.”

As he kneels in front of her, his hands go to her laced boots, the nicest pair she owns. They are sensible and not fanciful, perhaps not appropriate for a wedding. But he slips them off and then pauses, looking at her carefully. “May I?” he asks, his fingers dancing along her ankles. 

She nods, unsure of his actions but trusting him nonetheless. Slowly he slides his hands over her stockings and to her garter on her right thigh, untying it. The brush of his skin against hers in such an intimate place brings a flush to her cheeks. But she does not stop him. She wants all of what he can give her. 

Soon her legs are bare, covered to the knees by her shift. Edmund rests his hands on her knees and wets his lips, dark eyes glittering. “May I?”

Anna reaches out to brush her hand through his hair. “Yes.”

“You have no idea of what I’m asking,” he says, half-amused, half-frustrated. 

“I trust you,” she says simply, leaning down to kiss him softly. “I love you. Show me what to do.”

“Brave as a hellcat,” he murmurs, kissing her once. He pushes the skirt of her shift up to her hips, revealing her to the cool air. She is wet and achy between her thighs, but it seems to entice rather than put him off. 

“Jesus Christ,” he says, leaning into press a kiss to her knee. She chokes out a laugh on the blasphemy. “Anna – “

She twines her fingers into his hair and urges him forward, anxious to resolve this strange rise of heat and longing in her body. His lips trail over her thigh as he parts her legs. He strokes up with the fingers of his scarred hand opposite his mouth, until – until – 

“Oh – “ she gasps out, flushes and damp at her brow. His fingers press between her thighs into slick heat and he lets out a groan against her skin, his mouth pressed to the crease of her thigh and hip. Cleverly he touches her, strokes circling just at a place where she sees stars in her gaze. Her hips shift into the rhythm his hands create, shudders curling her bare toes against the cool floorboards. Through the roar in her ears she can hear him murmur her name, soft sounds and love words from his rasping throat. 

Then, he shifts his mouth and licks into her. 

Anna cannot help but whimper, startled and blushing but the press of his tongue and the way his fingers crook inside and against her makes her tremble with pleasure. She tangles her fingers into his hair and arches her back, overwhelmed with sensation. He licks and strokes until she is panting and moaning his name, trembling with the remnants of a sensation wholly unfamiliar, that she had only had glimpses of in his kiss and his touch. 

His lips, damp to touch, kiss her inner thigh. “Anna –“

Weak-limbed, she tugs on his hair, wanting to pull him up. Together they shift onto the bunk and he strips her of her shift as she works at the laces of his breeches. Her toes graze against cool leather and she laughs. 

Above her, he meets her gaze, a small smile quirking his lips. “Something amuses you?”

“Your shoes,” she whispers. 

He grins slightly and shifts away, divesting himself of his breeches, shoes and stockings. Naked but for her wedding ring, she curls into herself and watches him, all the broad strength of him. Her body feels lax and lovely from earlier, but she still wants more. 

When he tucks himself back over her, she presses herself to him, all that lovely warmth and muscle and skin. Edmund kisses her long and slow, unhurried though she can feel the hard press of his erection at her belly. His hand comes up to cover her breast, a thumb rubbing at her pebbled nipple. She gasps into his mouth, arching into his touch. Her thighs shift and part for his hip, cradling him close. 

“Edmund, please – “ she murmurs, voice husky. 

In the dim candlelight, his gaze is dark and sharp, honed entirely on her. “You are the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,” he whispers. “Anna, I love you.”

She wraps her arms around him and pulls him in close, kissing and licking at his throat, the stubble there, the sharp line of his collarbones. He shifts his weight onto an elbow, reaches down between their damp and flushed bodies, and presses inside of her. He fits as if he belongs, just a faint pinch and the sensation of pressure between them. 

For the rest of her life, Anna will never forget the expression on Edmund’s face as he moves within her, as he kisses her face, as she strokes her hands over his back and whispers to him. When he spills inside of her, it is with a low moan of her name, a trembling of his muscles. 

She kisses him, wrapped in his limbs, and never wants to leave his side. 

[-]


End file.
